JOSHUA SCHMIDT'S FIRST FULL-LENGTH score, a musical version of
Elmer Rice's acrid 1923 expressionist comedy The Adding Machine
(created with co-librettist Jason Loewith and directed by David Cromer)
debuted in 2007 at Evanston's Next Theatre and garnered thunderous
acclaim and awards in its 2008 Off-Broadway run at the Minetta Lane
Theatre. Schmidt returns to Chicago's North Shore suburbs for his
follow-up effort, A Minister's Wife, opening on May 19 at
Writers' Theatre in Glencoe.

Based on George Bernard Shaw's Candida and featuring a
libretto by Austin Pendleton and lyrics by Jan Tranen, the new show
presents different challenges for the 33-year-old composer. "Adding
Machine was eight discrete scenes, and each of the scenes in Rice are
long, expressionistic variations on a single gesture," notes
Schmidt, who caught those gestures through a brilliant score that moved
deftly from early modernism to Tin Pan Alley ballads. By contrast,
Schmidt says, Candida provides "this erotic tsunami as you move
toward the end of the play." In addition to presenting the show
sans intermission, Schmidt, Pendleton and director Michael Halberstam
hope to keep that tension intact through what Schmidt describes as
"a very muscular adaptation that amplifies the sophistication with
which Shaw explores relationships," while paring back those old
Shavian flights of exposition.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

As for inevitable comparisons to the more-famous musical Shaw
adaptation, Schmidt says, "Pygmalion is a very clear story in which
two men try to remake a peasant woman in their own image. In Candida,
two men assume a lot of things about a woman and project a lot of things
onto her. Pygmalion doesn't happen on a daily basis. However,
projecting assumptions about your relationship or someone else's
relationship does happen every day. The fact that it is commonplace
makes it more dangerous, and that makes it inherently more appealing to
me.''

Halberstam, who tried his hand at the libretto before passing it on
to Pendleton, describes Schmidt's score as "a hybrid between
classic music theatre and Victorian song styles." Schmidt also has
a few more instruments to play with this time out (including strings and
a clarinet) than he did with Adding Machine. For those fans who were
bowled over by the composer's first show and are expecting Adding
Machine, Part Deux, he says with a laugh, "I'm happy to
disappoint them."

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